Network Planning and Critical Path Method

Abstract

Scheduling a project is one of the main challenges in project management. According to ISO21502 'The purpose of schedule management is to enable work to be undertaken in a timely manner and to reduce slippage to an acceptable level. The schedule should be an integrated part of the project’s plan and developed under the direction of the project manager[1].

There are several scheduling techniques that can be used to plan and estimate the duration of a project according to its complexity and uncertainty. One of the most common is the critical path method or CPM. This scheduling tool calculates the theoretical early and late start and finish dates for all activities, with no resource constraints, performing a bottom-up analysis forward and backward the entire network [2]. The “critical path” is the longest sequence of activities that must finish in time to fully complete the project. However, it also determines the shortest period in which the project can be finished.

One of the benefits of using this tool is that allows to identify the most critical activities of the project. Moreover, if one of these is delayed, the project itself is compromised. Thus, it helps project managers to have a good overview in which task they must put more focus on. Nonetheless, CPM also has its limitations. In this article these disadvantages will be described and how to deal with them will be explained.